Yes lads!

Whilst Silva was a good player when we signed him, Madrid didn't want him. Barca neither. He wasn't in the sort of demand that Wirtz is at the moment. You can say the same for perhaps all our signings bar possibly Agüero and definitely Haaland.

Was just about to say this… when have we ever been a side that just signs ready made galacticos? If anything we’ve become known for being one of the only big sides that rarely does that. We take good players and make them exceptional.

Ederson? Remember he only cost £30m. Dias? Wasn’t on anybody’s radar, now he’s a treble winner and one of our best defenders. David Silva? Nobody expected him to spend a decade here and redefine what it was to be a centre midfielder in the Prem. Rodri? Did anybody have him pegged as a fucking Ballon d’Or Winner? Did they fuck. Kompany? Wasn’t even a bloody defender!

So this self-flagellating on here about the list of targets being “not up to scratch with our historical players” is utter nonsense. We’re City. We don’t buy legends, we make legends.
 
The problem is that even if we got everyone who most people want:

J.Garcia
Livramento
Cherki
Reijnders
Rodrigo

Is that amazingly exciting?
Is it KDB, D.Silva, Yaya, Sane standard we once had? Nope.

These players aren’t going to make us match PSG.

All PSG players are quick, fast and technical.

Haaland, Marmoush, Doku won’t close down defenders like they do.
Rodri Reijnders and Nico G are quick around the pitch and as tenacious as Vitinha, Neves and Ruiz.

We all have to face facts that our time of being the best is over for a few years.

This window won’t get us back.
(I can imagine this message won’t impress happy clappers but it’s the truth).

You might be right about it not being a quick fix and we may have a couple of years fighting for the top league positions rather than being way ahead or in a two horse race.

But the argument of "X signing(s) isn't (aren't) as good as Silva, yaya, de bruyne is very disingenuous.

Silva was up and coming and had yet to make his big move when we signed him.

Yaya had been shuffled around positions at Barca and was seen as a solid DM and not the game winner he became for us.

Kdb was player of the season in Germany but not yet seen as world class.

I would argue that reijnders and marmoush are very much at the stage in their career that gundogan and kdb were at when we signed them. Probably less progressed than Silva as he'd had the 2008 and 2010 Sprain tournament wins at that point. But they are the calibre of players we signed previously. Will they be as good? Dunno, but the best signings in the windows of previous seasons were very rarely widely considered to be as good as prime city yaya, kdb, and Silva.

I think Rodrigo is absolutely at a similar career phase to yaya (obviously different positions but leaving Spain's best team to get more game time)

Cherki is a bit of an unknown quantity given the rumours of his enterage and attitude but for the price it's a gamble worth taking given Foden has proven he can pick up the kdb slack over a full season - assuming he sorts his personal problems out over the summer.

It's not as black and white as your post makes it. We missed out on Alexis in 2017 when he was supposed to be our main signing. We already have most of the spine of the team intact with Dias, gvardiol, rodri, Foden, haaland. I could see the signings you listed above just as easily taking us to the title next season just as easily as I can see a couple more seasons in a scrap.
 
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Let's not overrate PSG now. They had a spanking brilliant final. But Arsenal gave them a toughie and Aston Villa worked them to near exhaustion.

Good on them for a great yeat, bur next year will be different. It might have been a different story anyway had Barcelona not punked out in the Semis.

Congratulations to then for a great year but they aren't far ahead of Arsenal or Liverpool. And we can close the gap on them all with what we are doing

We will start by taking Donarumma :)


You know what? I'm dropping a fiver on us winning Champs league next season.
Inter couldnt handle that intensity the same way Villa and Arsenal were more comfortable with, but PSG obviously still deserve credit.

I think we can beat them though with the right signings.
 
They would improve us. No disagreement there.

But people are going on how great and excited they are about these signings when all of them are worse than what we had.
They actually aren't worse than what we had. We had an oft-injured and aging Kev, an out of form Bernie, an aging Gundo and an injured Rodri. How can what we had this season be better? Unless you mean what we've had in the past.


If all the links pan out, I'll back us against anyone.
 
Whilst Silva was a good player when we signed him, Madrid didn't want him. Barca neither. He wasn't in the sort of demand that Wirtz is at the moment. You can say the same for perhaps all our signings bar possibly Agüero and definitely Haaland.

Goes to show how spoiled European football was back then for quality creative midfielders. Madrid were buying Ozil that summer and already had Kaka, Barca already had the two best in the world and were tapping up Fabregas too.

Wirtz is nowhere near Silva’s level, he’d be in ridiculous demand if he was around today.
 
Was just about to say this… when have we ever been a side that just signs ready made galacticos? If anything we’ve become known for being one of the only big sides that rarely does that. We take good players and make them exceptional.

Ederson? Remember he only cost £30m. Dias? Wasn’t on anybody’s radar, now he’s a treble winner and one of our best defenders. David Silva? Nobody expected him to spend a decade here and redefine what it was to be a centre midfielder in the Prem. Rodri? Did anybody have him pegged as a fucking Ballon d’Or Winner? Did they fuck. Kompany? Wasn’t even a bloody defender!

So this self-flagellating on here about the list of targets being “not up to scratch with our historical players” is utter nonsense. We’re City. We don’t buy legends, we make legends.
Great post
 
Remember Paul pretty much being the Don at transfers years ago, I sense he was pissed when he posted that this morning though
 
Let's not overrate PSG now. They had a spanking brilliant final. But Arsenal gave them a toughie and Aston Villa worked them to near exhaustion.

Good on them for a great yeat, bur next year will be different. It might have been a different story anyway had Barcelona not punked out in the Semis.

Congratulations to then for a great year but they aren't far ahead of Arsenal or Liverpool. And we can close the gap on them all with what we are doing

We will start by taking Donarumma :)


You know what? I'm dropping a fiver on us winning Champs league next season.
They did beat the shit out of us. Just saying. :)
 
If you look at the top players currently. City do have a few already.

Rodri
Foden
Haaland
Dias

You can argue all day about what players are better on their day to the ones above.

Most fans under appreciated their own players. It’s always the new player that is deemed better.

Add quality to that list and the above players return to form then it’s a formidable team.
Is Gvardiol not a top player ??
 
Is Gvardiol not a top player ??
Yes when at CB. He has his erm moments at fb which is partly pep’s fault for continuing to play him in that position. Very good player who can be added to that small list I suppose.

It wasn’t meant to be exhaustive but more a core to build upon based on previous seasons of excellence.
 
Can we begin speculating now?

Can't be a defender because even if it's a good signing, nobody gets excited about signing a right back.

Must be a big name to be 'outrageous.'

Doubt it's a striker as we won't play 2 up front.

Must be a winger seeing as cherki looks to be the chosen playmaker.
My money is on Barcola from PSG
 
A shit version of us. What would the Curt team who loat ro Madrid the year before treble have done to the City team that lost to PSG?

21/22 City would have annihilated 2025 City.
I agree, 100%. This season though, the current iteration of PSG beat the shit out of the 24/25 iteration of City.

I don't like. However, it did happen.
 
Yes when at CB. He has his erm moments at fb which is partly pep’s fault for continuing to play him in that position. Very good player who can be added to that small list I suppose.

It wasn’t meant to be exhaustive but more a core to build upon based on previous seasons of excellence.
No,he's just a top player,an absolute beast and a pleasure to watch
 

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